Aggies edge Seattle in WAC opener

New Mexico State's Ariadnne Sierra digs a ball off the floor earlier this season at the Pan American Center. Sierra, who attended Americas HS in El Paso, is one of the team's best defensive players this year.(Photo: Polo Orta/For the Sun-News)Buy Photo

LAS CRUCES – The New Mexico State volleyball team continued its winning ways, surviving a comeback attempt from Seattle University to earn their 17th Western Athletic Conference victory. NMSU won its conference opener (25-16, 25-15, 23-25, 21-25, 15-13) at the Pan American Center Thursday night.

After losing their last two home matches against Texas A&M and Arizona, the Aggies came out with a sense of urgency with an 11-3 run midway through the first set to extend a 7-6 lead out to 18-9. As a team, NMSU hit .138 in the first set, which is below their .242 average through their first 13 games, but the team was effective with its defense, forcing Seattle into a -.207 hitting percentage and only five kills, while getting five team blocks.

Reigning WAC Player of the Week Jordan Abalos led the way for the Aggies, along with sophomore Tatyana Battle. Abalos racked up 21 kills and seven digs, and Battle followed suit with 16 kills and four digs.

The second set was a back-and-forth affair until a Battle service error forced NMSU head coach Mike Jordan to call a timeout with the score tied at 12-12. After the timeout, the team appeared sharper, with their last 10 points of the set coming from kills. Setter Brianna Ainsworth nearly had a double-double after the second set with eight digs and 13 assists en route to a 13 dig, 33 assist night.

“In the first two sets, we blocked well, we got in their head a little bit and they didn’t play characteristically like themselves but I expected this to be a close match,” said Jordan. “That 10-minute break (after the second set) changes momentum sometimes and we came out and got really high error and (Seattle) service pressure improved."

Seattle won the third set by closing NMSU out with five straight points when the Aggies were two points away from a sweep. The fourth set saw a 20-20 tie and again, Seattle won the set, reeling off four out of the last five points, two of which came on service aces.

“We went from being the best we’ve looked this year to looking like we did the first weekend of the season," Jordan said. "We started to hope that they would make mistakes instead of us trying to make plays ourselves, and that’s really frustrating."

When the fifth set began, Jordan was unhappy with the lack of success the hitters were having, but the adjustments made after an NMSU timeout proved to be the difference in the deciding set. Abalos kept the Aggies ahead in the set with a kill and service ace to put the Aggies up 12-10, and after a Kassandra Tohm kill and a Seattle service error, Battle ended the game with a forceful kill, clinching the conference-opening win.

NMSU will return to the court Saturday against Utah Valley for a 1 p.m. conference match.

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Jordan Abalos finds a gap between Seattle blockers in Thursday night's WAC volleyball match on Thursday at the Pan American Center.(Photo: Polo Orta/For the Sun-News)